Currently, an event such as a meeting, a lecture, a class, or a seminar is held in a meeting room, a classroom, or the like, where people gather. For example, when a meeting is held in a meeting room or the like, the meeting room is reserved in advance using a reservation system or the like, and when a participant has arrived at the meeting room at a reserved time, meeting materials are distributed in the meeting room and the meeting is held for a reserved period of time.
In addition, currently, the use of paper is gradually being reduced in meeting rooms and the like. For example, currently, a system is known in which materials to be used in a meeting are distributed in the form of electronic data using devices such as notebook personal computers (PCs) or tablet terminals, and the meeting is held while participants are displaying the distributed materials on screens of the devices. The electronic data such as meeting materials is stored in a certain file server and managed.
With respect to the management of a meeting room and the management of meeting materials or the like, some methods are known. For example, currently, a method is known in which electronic files to be used in a meeting, personal information regarding participants in the meeting, and the like are transmitted using direct communication between personal handy-phone system (PHS) terminals. In addition, currently, a method is known in which an introduction screen for introducing a plurality of meeting videos is created and displayed, and one in which a user is interested is found among the plurality of meeting videos in a short period of time. In addition, currently, a method is known in which seating and leaving are detected using a seating sensor mounted on each chair and an external apparatus such as lighting is controlled, and a method is known in which participants are registered during reservation for a meeting and meeting materials in a server are transmitted on the basis of identification information issued to those who have been registered (for example, refer to Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 11-46191, Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 2005-352933, Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 2010-236881, and Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 2003-304518).
However, for example, when data files such as meeting materials are managed in a server or the like, since files exist for each event, a lot of files are stored in the server. Therefore, in the methods in the related art, it is difficult to find files to be used among a lot of stored files.
The files in the server may be deleted after a meeting ends, but a creator of the files often forgets to delete the files after the meeting ends, and it is difficult to distinguish the files remaining even after the end of the meeting from files to be used in future meetings.
With respect to the above problem, for example, the files of meeting materials may be deleted upon an end of use time of a meeting room using, for example, time information or the like of a reservation system or the like. However, in the case of an actual meeting, the meeting rarely ends exactly at an end of a reserved period of time; the meeting might continue even after the end of the reserved period of time, or might end at a time earlier than the end of the reserved period of time. Therefore, if the files in the server are deleted using the reserved period of time as a reference, the files of the meeting materials might be deleted even when the meeting is still being held, or might not be deleted even when the meeting has already ended. Therefore, it is desirable to improve the accuracy of estimating an end of an event such as a meeting.